Special Dorms for Married Veterans

WORLD WAR II has brought many changes to the Dartmouth campus but nothing has seemed quite so unprecedented and intriguing as the prospect of wives taking up residence with their student husbands in the two dormitories which the College has set aside to house married veterans. Fayerweather Hall will be open to these couples when the new term starts on November 1, and as soon as South Fayerweather Hall is emptied of its present civilian students it too will be remodeled into small suites to accommodate returning servicemen and their wives.

The suites in Middle Fayerweather will consist mostly of two rooms with private lavatory and will be rented on a monthly basis. They will be partially furnished by the College and will also be equipped with kitchenette units for light housekeeping when these arrive about December 1. Bathing facilities for men and women will be assigned on alternate floors.

In assigning these dormitory suites, the College will give preference to veterans who were married prior to discharge from the service and to those having previous affiliation with Dartmouth. Veterans with children will not live in the dormitories, but priority on College-owned houses or apartments not occupied will be given to them. At least five veterans with families are known to be registering for the November term.

In addition to setting aside two dormitories and making available whatever other College housing it can, the Committee on Student Residence has prepared a list of Hanover houses in which married couples, willing to obtain their meals outside, can rent furnished or unfurnished rooms. It has also prepared a special list of houses where children can be accommodated and where the use of kitchen facilities will be allowed by arrangement with the landlord. A Hanover town committee is compiling a list of apartments in communities within motoring distance of the College and, in conjunction with the College, is encouraging local home owners to provide apartments by remodeling rooming houses and adding private baths and kitchenettes. Programs such as the latter are looking ahead to the even greater need of housing for married veterans in the March term.

Dartmouth officials have also been negotiating with the Public Housing Authority as to the possible erection in Hanover of a number of small houses of temporary or portable construction. Such projects for the housing of veterans have been sanctioned by the Lanham Act, but appropriations have not yet been voted by Congress. This development, which cannot be completed before March, will take place on the site of the Lebanon Street tennis courts if the. College's current negotiations bear fruit.

One other possibility for Dartmouth veterans is the group of private dwelling units built by the Public Housing Authority at Strafford, Vt., 17 miles away, in connection with a wartime mining project there.

With houses and apartments in Hanover already at a premium, the extraordinary and temporary demand for living quarters for married veterans has created a real problem for the College. The Committee on Student Residence, in anticipation of this postwar situation, has been at work on the problem during the past year, and the College's order of kitchenette units, for example, was placed some time before V-J Day. The units in question are of one-piece design and include an electric stove with oven, an ice box, sink, and cabinet. Wiring and plumbing for their installation will be completed by November 1 so that the units can be used immediately upon their arrival.

The Committee on Student Residence is headed by Dean Lloyd K. Neidlinger '23 and includes Dean Robert C. Strong '24, Halsey C. Edgerton 'O6, Max A. Norton '19, Willard M. Gooding '11, Albert I. Dickerson '30, and Prof. Francis J. Neef.

From information sent to the College by veterans applying for admission or readmission, it is expected that about 20 per cent of the veterans enrolling at Dartmouth will be married. Between two and three hundred ex-servicemen will be enrolled in the November term, and by next March it is estimated that perhaps as many as a thousand veterans will be registered at the College.